Farmer Friday

Most eggs right now are coming from new pullets

Welcome to Farmer Friday, a recap of the past week here on my little farm. Egg production is still down due to a majority of the flock being senior ladies that quit as soon as it gets hot. Waiting to see how many pick back up when it cools off and who needs to meet some dumplings.

Salting the cheese curd

Some clabber cheese

I made cheese this week, experimenting with clabber. That is the technique of filtering warm raw milk into a clean jar and capping it lightly. You leave it out on the counter to begin to sour or clabber. I started with 8 ounces then the next day poured it into a quart jar and added more warm fresh from the goat milk. The day after I added that to about 2 1/2 gallons of milk, some fresh, some from the fridge. Warmed it up and let it sit about an hour, then warmed it up to 90F and added some rennet. After draining and salting the curd I pressed it in molds overnight. It's very much like some Queso Fresco I've had.

Soap in the freezer makes it easier to unmold

I've made several batches of Goat Milk Soap this week. 

Goat Milk Soap with Lavender essential oil

I also finished cutting bars of soap made earlier in the month. My soap is super fatted and can be a little sticky when first unmolded so I let it sit to firm up then begin cutting individual bars. Altogether it has to sit and cure 6-8 weeks after making. That is so the bars harden up and don't melt away when you use them.

Making Goat Milk Lotion with Prickly Pear juice

I made some Goat Milk Lotion with prickly pear cactus juice. Prickly pear is supposed to have healing properties similar to aloe vera.

Sonoran Desert or Colorado River Toad

I have quite a few poisonous toads hanging around. So far Digger has not tried to eat one, just barks at them.

Some peaches from Nida's Peach

I had to pick the peaches, even though they are not soft ripe yet, the birds and squirrels were just too much.

Harvest 8/30

All ready to go to the Globe-Miami Farmers Market

This week's harvest included cucuzzi gourd, tomatoes and Japanese eggplant.

Tithonia aka Mexican Sunflower

A lot of other things went on this week, yard clean up continues, the triplets broke their mineral feeder and I had to fix that.The cucuzzi gourds are taking over the trellis by the house and trying to expand their territory while the pumpkins in the back garden are trying to take over the world. Even more things in the video!

All in a Day's Work

 

So yesterday was a very busy and pretty productive day. I didn't have to be anywhere else so I was able to stay home and focus on things I needed to get done. There is still a huge long list of things to do but I was able to cross some off yesterday.

I made goat milk soap and lotion. I gave the prickly pear juice a final straining and made some prickly pear lemonade. I set a pot of cheese and just before bed got the curds salted, drained and put into the molds and the press. Oh yea and I fixed the mineral feeder that the triplets broke a couple days ago.

I love the color of fresh prickly pear fruit, although it does fade under light and heat. Here I've cheated and bought a natural brand of lemonade, basically like what I would make from scratch, lemon juice, water, sugar and mixed it 50-50 with the prickly pear juice. Totally delicious.

Prickly pear is supposed to have healing properties similar to aloe vera so I used it to make Goat Milk Soap, Lotion and Sugar Scrub.

This Week

It’s been a busy week but I did squeeze in some hill time to go from this… 

To this. A bit more picking to do but getting there. 

The sun doesn’t come over the mountain until about 8:30 now. It’ll be after 9:00 Dec 21. 

Sent some extra cockerels off to freezer camp

Doing chores by headlamp in the morning sucks but the sunrise is pretty 

Made a yummy cheesecake from chèvre. Cheated and bought crust. Did you know they come in pecan now? It’s so yellow from my egg yolks. 

This poor chicken had a bad case of fowl pox but also somehow it’s eye is infected. Not sure it’s going to make it but she’s up eating and drinking so I’m doctoring. 

Mmmm. Posie your legs are just too short. I did find my beat up, dented 40 year old milk pail. It’s a bit shorter than this new one so using it now. The new one is fine under big tall goats but Posie has really short legs. 

I worked a bit getting grass out of this bed. Will take a few days before it’s all done and ready to plant again. 

Mmm. Pulled some carrots to cook. Not sure if they have nematode damage at all, it doesn’t look like it although forked roots can be a symptom these look more like the soil is not deep enough. I should probably double dig these beds before I try carrots again. 

And I found a heart rock  

#appreciation

Today I appreciate that the weather has been really nice. 

Some Progress

Don’t know what’s up but Caramel and Posie have been butting heads. 

After Caramel tried to break the milk stand I added some runners so it can’t tip forward again. 

I cut off the little seat because it seemed to be making it unstable and raked and leveled the ground. So far so good 

I made up some soil blocks  and planted some seeds 

I’ve worked two mornings in the hill pen. I’m afraid this corner isn’t going to hold so hot the idea to wrap another cattle panel around it and fill the space with rock

I think it will work out ok. 

And I worked some more on the slope. 

Sunrise was beautiful this morning 

Bambi did not want to come up the hill today!

I made some salty rennet cheese. 

And cooked down some chicken broth 

Apparently I’m spider woman since not only is my house full of webs they are now taking over the car. Don’t mind the hay. The truck was down a couple of weeks 

And tonight Caramel was just ridiculous for absolutely no reason at all. She didn’t even finish her grain (she’s not a grain hog like Posie and doesn’t eat it all on the stand). The dog was no where to be. Seen   I really don’t know what’s up with her. 

#appreciation

Appreciating some extra time off to get things done